Clear rules needed to govern prices of infrastructure project transfers The Saigon Times Daily Nguyen Dinh Cung, president of the Central Institute for Economic Management (CIEM), talked to local reporters about the transfers of operation rights to airports and seaports on the sidelines of the institute’s recent workshop in Hanoi. Excerpts: What do you comment on transfers of the operation rights to airports and seaports to private investors? – Nguyen Dinh Cung: The Government now has a policy to raise more capital from the private sector to fund infrastructure projects. One of the methods is to transfer the operation rights to airports and seaports to private investors. The ultimate goal is to boost infrastructure development and improve service quality for people. With this policy, we can partially sell properties to raise funds for other infrastructure projects while establishing a competitive market for services at airports and seaports. More service providers will help enhance quality and support development of other sectors. These are measures to create more benefits for people and fuel economic growth. How can we prevent monopoly at transferred seaports and airports? – Preventing monopoly in investments and service supply is the biggest concern so it is important to design a market mechanism for this area. The owners of airports should not be airlines and many countries have limited airlines’ ownership of airports. Besides, an investor should not be allowed to own many airports to secure healthy competition. The State should not deeply intervene into service price determination and…